A randomly chosen page from my novel Crunch, a book about collapse, about control (and the lack of it). 

Page 4:

the man and adheres her message to his pubic hair with the green square draping over the shaft of the penis. That would change everything, he says, fastening the penultimate button at the top of his shirt. The woman he is addressing has bent down to retrieve her bra from the floor and, standing now, slips it on over her breasts and fastens it at her back in one fluid motion. It’s just a possibility, she says, don’t go picking out names just yet. The corners of her mouth curl down to stifle a grin. The man is not amused. He challenges her for a moment with a hard, granite look, then exhales briskly through his nostrils. Some of us aren’t so flippant about these issues, he tells her. No? she replies, and how about the cocks of these serious fellows? Are they concerned? Clearly upset now, the man turns away from her and fishes a sport coat from the back of a chair that has been set at a 45-degree angle from the rectangular mirror that stretches across a large portion of the hotel room’s wall. The woman comes up behind him and wraps her arms around his midsection, interlacing her fingers just above his navel. Her chin nestles into the crook of his neck. Her eyes close and the line of her lips softens. The shoulders of the farmer, working under a bright afternoon sun, twist to his right as he brings the hoe up from the dirt, stretches it forward and plants it down again hard into the earth. His elbows bend, biceps flex, as he drags the hoe toward himself, plowing the dirt, then twists his shoulders again to lift the tool and repeat the action. A single bead of sweat runs